


can't touch the sky

by plinys



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Bad Things Happen Bingo, F/M, falling through the ice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-15
Updated: 2019-09-15
Packaged: 2020-10-19 12:57:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20657642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plinys/pseuds/plinys
Summary: When a mission goes wrong and Ray falls through the ice, and Nora left without her magic feels more powerless than ever.





	can't touch the sky

**Author's Note:**

> i was stuck on one of my wips so i let my twitter followers pick a bad things bingo prompt to do and they picked "falling through the ice"

There’s a feeling of helplessness.

A feeling that Nora is not used to.

They saved the world, saved time, and everything was supposed to go back to happily ever after. 

Except there was still a little bit of time to look after, missions that they made for themselves now that the Time Bureau had fallen apart, and while after everything Nora had been accepted onto the team (which made sense since she was currently taking up full time residence in Ray’s bedroom), there was still something that wasn’t quite right. 

She was still a fairy godmother.

And while Gary had tried to release her, inspired by a childhood of watching disney movies, things hadn’t exactly gone according to plan.

Certainly, she wasn’t tied to any specific persons whims and wills, wasn’t forced to wear that terribly obnoxious blue dress. But she was also without magic for the first time since she had been thirteen years old and it had taken some… Adjusting. 

John had insisted multiple times that magic was something that could be relearned, that one day she would be able to get it all back, even if now every time she held up her hands waiting for that familiar thrum in her veins to appear there was nothing there. 

Patience, a virtue that Nora had never been particularly fond of. 

Especially not when someone she cared about (a list that was already small and limited to Ray, John, and Ava) was in danger. Because as nice as the many reassurances that her magic would eventually come back were, she needed something sooner than eventually, she needed something  _ right now _ . 

Her self preservation had been tossed out the window long ago, the second that they ice had cracked beneath their feet - a hit from the  _ baddie of the week  _ spreading fire across the frozen surface - and Ray had slipped down into the cold frozen waters below Nora had been spurred into action. 

This would have been so much easier with magic, but as that was no longer an option and John was too far away to act quick enough, Nora had plunged down into the water without a second thought relying on all those years of childhood swimming lessons that her father had forced her into, to come back now as muscle memory, if only to have a chance of saving him.

It had worked. 

She’d been able to hold onto him, tug him up out of the water and back to the surface. But while Nora had had time to prepare for the frozen water, to hold her breath as she dived down, Ray had not and- 

“We need to get you both to the med bay,” someone rational - Sara, apparently - says. Hands pulling her off of Ray - Ray, whose skin has gone deathly pale, who isn’t waking up, who might be gone and she can’t do anything. 

Can’t save him.

What was the point of being  _ good  _ if she can’t save the people she loves? 

By the time they make it back onto the ship someone has tossed a blanket over her shoulders, and she shoots him - Mick, surprisingly - a thankful look. Rationally she knows that she should probably go change. She’s taken of her soaked through winter jacket at least, but her shirt and jeans are still dripping wet as well, creating a small puddle underneath when she sits in the medbay chair watching Ray. 

According to Gideon he’s alive, his heart beating an unsteady rhythm, but it’s there. She wasn’t too late to save him. That should count for something. But sitting there, pulling the shock blanket tighter around herself, wet hair sticking to her face, doing nothing more than  _ watch _ as the man she loves struggles to stay alive… It doesn’t feel like nearly enough. 

She should be able to heal him.

She’s healed before.

But now…

“Haircut will be okay,” Mick says. 

Nora hadn’t even realized that he was still there until he spoke. Everyone else had cleared out around the time that Nora had refused to let them strap her into one of the chairs for testing, and Gideon had in turn confirmed that Ray would be  _ fine _ \- whatever that means - and that they would just have to wait until he woke up - however long that might be. 

Something which is easier said than done. 

“You don’t know that,” Nora says. Her voice smaller than it normally would be. Hesitant. Because as much as she wants to believe that jumping into the water to pull him up was enough, she can’t help but look at the lack of color still on his features, the weak way he breathes, and feel as though she’s failed him. “I know, Gideon said that he will be but it’s not…” She’s not sure why she’s telling Mick this of all people. They’re certainly not close by any stretch. In fact, as far as people she could be close with, he’s towards the bottom of the list. But in the moment, anyone to confide in seems to be enough. “I’ve never felt more useless.”

She knows that the Legends took her in because of Ray, that they found a place on this team of misfits purely because one of their founding members had fallen for her. But at least before she could have been able to pull her weight, could have actually been useful on missions. 

“I’m no hero,” Nora says. She never has been, never will be, she may not be a  _ villain  _ or possessed by a demon anymore but she wasn’t… 

“No, you’re not.” 

It’s not as though she had been looking for sympathy.

But Mick’s gruff tone still shocks her all the same.

And she turns her head sharply to look at him.

“Neither am I.” 

She knows this too, has heard his backstory. They’ve both got a life of crime behind them, time behind bars, and a prison break or two. More in common that Nora would like to admit, which is probably why she had done her best to avoid ever having a conversation with him. 

“That’s different,” Nora insists. “You’ve been here longer and people change and you can do things, fight people, whereas I…” 

_I can’t_ _save anyone_. 

Mick doesn’t reply. Not really, just leaves her a steady look, eyes unwavering before he finally raps his knuckles against the machine monitoring Ray’s unsteady heartbeat. 

“You think think this would still be beating if it weren’t for you?” 

“If I had my magic, he wouldn’t even be in the medbay,” Nora insists. 

Mick just shakes her head.

As if she doesn’t get it. 

She does. 

It’s impossible to understand, just like it’s impossible to make him understand that it still doesn’t feel like enough.

That it never will.

“He wouldn’t want you to catch a cold,” is all Mick says in the end, before finally turning away and leaving the medbay just as the others have. 

There’s a part of her that knows that he is right. That without her quick thinking they might have truly lost Ray, and not for the first time either. But Nora can’t help the feeling that churns in her stomach, that insists that it’s not enough, that knows the longer the two of them stay on the Waverider the more chances there are for Ray to get hurt and Nora to not be able to do anything to protect her. 

Why did they have to be heroes, to be  _ legends _ , why couldn’t she just get a happily ever after? 

She curls up in the other chair, to watch the way his chest rises and falls, proof that Ray is alive, and tries as she waits to convince herself that she did enough. 

  
  


(“You saved me.” 

There’s thankfulness in his eyes, something she barely thinks that she deserves. “I tried.”)


End file.
